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Last edited by IAmHolland; 09-20-2018 at 12:47 AM.
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Last edited by IAmHolland; 09-20-2018 at 12:47 AM.
Boy I am late to the Party aren't I???????
Kurt, the shower (On no, he didn't just call this a "Shower" ) is coming along nicely. I can't wait to see how many times you have to install and remove those diffuser disks until you find just the right configuration that distributes the water evenly across the entire surface of the Rio Media blocks.
That FlowFriendPro is pretty amazing to provide that much water for that little wattage. At 70 watts I could probably get 3000 GPH through a few of my airlift manifolds at 11" of lift, if I got the submergence deep enough, but there is no way I could get the 7000+ GPH without using almost 3 times that electricity.
Now onto The Debate...
Can someone show me where "crashing, shearing, splashing, etc..." of water onto a surface is superior at oxygenation, VS simple old surface area interaction with the atmosphere?
Surface area interaction with the atmosphere is where 99% of the aeration of the pond is achieved when using aerated bottom drains. It isn't the small air bubbles being pumped into the water that aerates the pond, it is the bringing the water deep in the pond up to the surface so the water molecules will have interaction with the atmosphere and aerate the pond.
My thoughts have always been that if you can break up 8,000 GPH into over 1700 individual streams of water (that is the minimum flow rate for the Full Sized Zakki Shower and how many holes there are in the distribution manifold), then you will aerate that water better than if you used a simple pipe spraybar and broke that water into 100 JETS of water at the top of the shower. That is why I made the Zakki Showers with that complex distribution manifold so that I could evenly break up that water and turn it into a shower instead of a spraybar. With a spraybar...Once that water touches the media, it stops being a jet and it starts to slowly meander down the surface of the media until it gets to the bottom of the show tray. Then it breaks up into maybe 100 thick streams of water and flows onto the second layer of media in your standard showers. The only crashing, smashing, hair pulling that happens in these multi-stack trays is at the very top under the spraybar and maybe at the top of each media stack if the trays are separated enough. everywhere else in the media pack the water is gracefully flowing around or through the media and it certainly isn't crashing.
Now that we have this Rio Media in nice 12" x 12" x 2" thick blocks we can break up this water after every single block of media and aerated so much better than when I was using 2"x2"x2" Cermedia blocks and enclosing them in a single perforated basket.
Then I let the water pass through the Rio Media blocks for nitrification, and then I break the water back up with my divider plates (same ones Kurt is using in this shower) so it can get aerated again before passing through the second Rio Media block. So lets play with some numbers using Kurts shower as an example...
There are 12 Rio Media columns in this shower
There are 3 blocks total in each column
There are 2 of my divider plates in each column, that will actually break up the water into tiny drops for aeration purposes (we are going to ignore whatever distribution plate that Kurt makes on top of the media and the bottom divider plate because it may be slightly submerged at the bottom thus not breaking up the water)
There will be at most 10,000 GPH going through this shower, so if it is evenly distributed that is 833 GPH going through each stack of media
After the water passes through the top block of media it will be broken up into roughly 484 individual streams by my divider plate before it falls onto the second block of media
That is 1.7 gallons per hour passing through each hole of the divider plate so that should provide plenty of dwell time to aerate those drops
Then it will pass through the second block for nitrification before being broken up again into 484 streams and then into the third Rio block
So... 12(484 + 484) = 11,616 individual streams of water that are constantly in contact with the atmosphere for exchanging of gasses
If this shower (oh crap I did it again) does NOTHING ELSE it will perforation aeration and nitrification better than anyone can imagine, and it will do it at an incredibly low energy cost.
Just for fun I am going to leave this video here for aeration purposes... This is 3,150 GPH flowing through each stack of Rio Media (6,300 GPH Total)
Zac Penn.... Please sign-up for our MAILING LIST HERE904-294-2231
Zac@DeepwaterKoi.com
www.DeepwaterKoi.com
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Last edited by IAmHolland; 09-20-2018 at 12:45 AM.
It's located on a packed sand bed. Keep in mind that it won't ever be that heavy even when operating, because the enclosure will never have more than maybe 1" of water in it.
Zac will have to provide the size of the ones he produces, but mine is roughly 53" x 41", ignoring the odd shape, which was dictated by where it's placed. My design has the goal of having the lowest practical height to minimize pumping losses.
FlowFriend Pro flow data is here: http://www.air-aqua.nl/nl/FlowFriend...0-2550_rpm.pdf As mentioned elsewhere, I'm running 900* rpm and confirmed it's drawing 70W. Full disclosure, I have not measured the actual flow, but backed the 27 cubic meter (7132 gallon) number out from their flow data. Given the reaction here to Zac's pump testing though, even if I measured a number, there would probably be a bunch of drama about its accuracy. Total dynamic head is also unknown, but static head is only about 5", so 11" (per the chart) seems reasonable. Again, they're awesome pumps, but only within their own playground (very low head). A dynamic head higher than maybe 1 meter starts to argue for other solutions, and all dependent upon energy costs.
* It's being run at 900 rpm with the moving-bed filter. It'll be increased by "some amount" once the shower is up and running. Swapping in the shower filter increases total head by around 11", so power use will increase - BUT, since I'm eliminating the aeration pump from the moving-bed, it will likely not increase overall consumption.
Last edited by kimini; 09-17-2018 at 02:34 PM.
I guess I forgot to mention in my previous post that I DID NOT DESIGN OR BUILD this shower!!!!! I provided a few tips and tricks on the filter and made the suggestion about the distribution manifold, and I supplied the Rio Media and the divider trays but everything else was all Kurt.
So yes I sell the divider plates and the media to anyone that wants. The media over time will turn a brownish color depending on how much work it is actually doing. If you have more media than is needed on a pond then the color would be sandy tan color, but if you are overloading it then it will turn dark brown and have a thick coating of bacteria on it.
Kurt's shower is twice as large, footprint wise, as the Full Sized Zakki Shower which is roughly 49" x 21" x 23" or more tall based on how much media you use and how you stack it.
Based on how spread out this design is, and how much the water will be spread out, I imagine all of the nitrification work will be completed before the water gets halfway through the second block. But, it is better safe than sorry so having that 3rd block will be a good safety factor.
Zac Penn.... Please sign-up for our MAILING LIST HERE904-294-2231
Zac@DeepwaterKoi.com
www.DeepwaterKoi.com
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Last edited by IAmHolland; 09-20-2018 at 12:45 AM.
The shear size of this shower is what makes a standard distribution manifold nearly impossible with this little bit of water flow. If I he made one similar to my design it would require at least 16,000 GPH to be even somewhat evenly distributed over that square footage. The simple pipe design is the easiest way to ensure the inlet water is going to be distributed evenly to all of the blocks. Then he can make individual diffuser plates that will spread the water out over the blocks.
Zac Penn.... Please sign-up for our MAILING LIST HERE904-294-2231
Zac@DeepwaterKoi.com
www.DeepwaterKoi.com
Plus, using a large angled and perforated plate would require more head pressure due to needing to pump the water higher.
Last edited by kimini; 09-17-2018 at 05:56 PM.
I can see where your head is at, but in order to get the force to spread the water that way would require back pressure on the diffuser and that would be against what Kurt is trying to do. What I suggested was just a flat plate with a certain sequence of holes drilled in it so the water cup up out of the pipe and has to travel outward on the diffuser plate until all the water has dropped through the spaced out holes. This way there is no extra head pressure to overcome.
Zac Penn.... Please sign-up for our MAILING LIST HERE904-294-2231
Zac@DeepwaterKoi.com
www.DeepwaterKoi.com
I know in this case it is not what he is after. But I use a spray bar and do crash the water over my 1st tier and have a 4 tier shower. I'm getting even flow over my media and am using 128 watts on the ff standard at 1240 rpm and 6 feet head height. I don't really see the benefit of the super low shower profile. Seems to take away from the whole oxygen exchange from open air. I can send 3500gph over a 4 tier shower and the same as 14,000 gallons over 4 times the size and a 1 tier. I think that is zacs point as well.
You caught me with some free time and since you're giving hard numbers, it's something I can check.
Below is the flow data on the FlowFriend website (https://www.air-aqua.nl/en/Manual_FlowFriend_GB2015.pdf), and if we go up the vertical axis to 6 ft (1.8 meters), at 1240 rpm, the FF pumps exactly zero, so the claimed numbers are either incorrect or contrived. My suspicion is it's actually pulling around 165 watts and running at 1400 rpm or so. I always get suspicious when "accidental errors" benefit the person making an argument, but whatever.
(As an aside, it was surprising to see that the FF Pro consumes 380 watts (!) to move the same water above. It just goes to show that you have to pick a pump best suited for how it'll be used. The FF Pro is, at lower head values, more efficient than the FF Standard.)
Let's use a simplistic example of four one-ft square media blocks. In Filter A, they're stacked vertically and have 3,500 gph running through the column. In Filter B, the blocks are laying side by side and have 14,000 gph running over them. I agree that in both filters, each block sees 3,500 gph. The flaw is assuming that each block is doing the same amount of bio-filtering in both cases. In filter A, the top block does the majority of the bio-filtration, and since each subsequent block gets the same water, each has less and less filtration to do. As Zac himself said, by the time you get through the second block, the others below it aren't doing anything. So, while these two filters have the same flow per block, their effectivity is very different.
Since Zac is building low-profile filters, he likely disagrees. Regardless, we'll see, maybe I'll eat my words, but I bet water quality will be just fine, and that, combined with a low electric bill, is the point of the whole project.
Last edited by kimini; 09-21-2018 at 04:43 PM.